The Medieval Masia & the Family Revival

The story of Can Lleó begins not in the present, but in the deep past — a past written in parchment, stone, and the slow accumulation of harvests. The first documented mention of the property dates to 1497, but it was in 1751 that the Lleó family's connection to wine was formally sealed. In the post-mortem inventory of Jaume Lleó, the estate was recorded as having produced 100 cargas of wine — approximately 12,160 litres — in a single vintage. The cellar already contained 52 barrels of chestnut and oak, ranging from 9 to 14 cargas, tended by Joan Pons de Cal Gayetano dels Hostalets, the local barrel-maker who kept the winery's wooden vessels in working order. The wine was sold through brokers in Barcelona, transported in 700-litre bocoyes by cart, with prices negotiated annually according to alcoholic degree. By 1800, Can Lleó wine was a known commodity in the Catalan capital, and by 1956, the estate's wine commanded 5 pesetas per unit — a price that, compared to cereal, made viticulture the more profitable crop and encouraged the gradual replacement of grain fields with vines.

The Lleó family were not merely farmers; they were viticultural pioneers. Modesto Lleó, one of the great promoters of the estate's wines, participated in the International Phylloxera Congress of 1880 and received multiple distinctions for his wines. The cellar was managed for a period by Antonio Massana — father of the future owner of the celebrated bodega Eudald Massana i Noya — who brought technical rigour to the historic winery. But the 20th century brought change. In 1976, Guillermo Lleó Royo, the grandfather of the current owner, sold the finca to Antonio Massana. The property passed out of direct Lleó hands, and by 1986, wine production ceased entirely. The masia — with its medieval origins, its 17th-century winery, and its neoclassical 18th-century chapel, the Ermita de la Mare de Déu del Roser — fell into a long silence. The barrels were emptied. The presses stopped. The stone cellars, with their spectacular underground nave, waited.

The revival began when the property was recovered by the Lleó family — specifically by doctors Alberto Lleó and Judith Balmaña, who understood that the estate was not merely a real asset but a cultural one. Protected as a Bien Cultural de Interés Local (Cultural Asset of Local Interest), the masia and its chapel represent a living fragment of Penedès heritage. The decision to restart winemaking was not commercial in the conventional sense; it was an act of restoration — of recovering a family tradition that had been interrupted but never extinguished. To lead the project, they engaged Joan Asens as technical director and Aina Mariné as oenologist, with Joan Bonfill supervising the viticultural work. The first modern vintage was bottled in January 2023 — a small, precise, deeply considered collection of wines that marked the end of 36 years of silence and the beginning of a new chapter written in the same stone rooms where Jaume Lleó's 100 cargas had been recorded nearly three centuries earlier.

The guiding philosophy of Can Lleó de Vilanoveta is expressed in Joan Asens's own words: el vino se hace en la viña — the wine is made in the vineyard. This is not a rejection of cellar technique but a statement of priority: that the most important decisions are made among the vines, not among the tanks. The grapes are hand-harvested into 15-kilogram boxes to preserve the fruit, then brought to the 17th-century winery for gentle destemming and pressing. Fermentation is conducted with indigenous yeasts — no commercial inoculations, no enzymatic corrections, no chaptalisation, no acidification. The wines are handled with minimal intervention, allowed to settle naturally, and aged in a combination of large French oak foudres, stainless steel tanks, and the cool, vaulted underground cellar that has been the estate's ageing room for four centuries. The goal is to express the natural personality of each vineyard, each variety, and each vintage — to let the Alt Penedès speak through the bottle without disguise.

The Brisat Macabeu Vinya Meix is the estate's most detailed wine to date — a skin-contact white that reveals the full potential of old-vine Macabeo on calcareous soil. The grapes from the 1974 vineyard are hand-harvested, destemmed, and gently pressed, then fermented in stainless steel with indigenous yeasts at a controlled temperature of 17–18°C. The cap is punched down minimally, keeping the wine in contact with the skins for 25 days — an extended maceration that extracts texture, phenolic complexity, and the earthy, spicy nuances that only old-vine Macabeo can provide. After maceration, the wine is transferred to another tank for natural decanting, with 7% press wine added for extra density. The ageing continues for five months without lees stirring, split between a 1,200-litre French oak foudre of fine grain and a 1,000-litre stainless steel tank. The result is a wine of 12% alcohol, straw-yellow colour, and a tactile glyceric sensation balanced by vibrant acidity — a wine that Joan Asens describes as seeking freshness rather than mere ripeness.

The Ancestral Parellada Vinya Martra is the estate's sparkling wine — a pet-nat of 100% Parellada, bottled without DO to honour the traditional method rather than the regulatory framework. It is a wine of natural bubbles, floral delicacy, and the kind of yeasty, bready depth that only ancestral-method sparkling wine can achieve. The Genuí Garnatxa la Casilla d'en Pep is the estate's young red — 100% Red Garnacha from the sun-drenched la Casilla d'en Pep vineyard, fermented with indigenous yeasts and bottled to capture the immediate, juicy, fruit-forward pleasure of Mediterranean Garnacha at its freshest. The estate has also produced additional Brisat wines — both Macabeo and Parellada — under the DO Penedès, extending the skin-contact philosophy across multiple varieties and sites. Each wine is distinct, but all share a common origin: the calcareous soils of the Alt Penedès, the old bush vines of the Lleó family, and the cool darkness of a 17th-century cellar where time, gravity, and indigenous yeast do the work.

The future of Can Lleó is tied to the continued restoration of the historic winery, the deepening of organic practices across the 100 hectares, and the gradual evolution of a portfolio that now speaks to both the heritage-conscious drinker and the natural wine enthusiast. The Brisat Macabeu will continue to be the white flagship — a wine that proves old-vine Macabeo on limestone can achieve world-class expression when handled with patience and honesty. The Ancestral Parellada will continue to capture the joyful, celebratory side of the project. The Genuí Garnatxa will continue to prove that the Penedès can produce reds of immediate pleasure and honest fruit. And as the newly planted Sumoll vines mature, the estate will add another chapter to its recovery of indigenous Catalan varieties — a living proof that the most important wine is not the one that scores highest, but the one that carries the memory of the place where it was grown.

To understand Can Lleó de Vilanoveta, one must understand that it is not merely a winery; it is a heritage recovery project, a family act of restitution, and a cultural monument returned to its original purpose. The masia — first mentioned in 1497, with wine records dating to 1751, a 17th-century winery, and an 18th-century neoclassical chapel — is protected as a Bien Cultural de Interés Local. The Lleó family, who made wine here for centuries until 1986, have returned to their ancestral seat not to build a brand, but to continue a tradition. The current owners, Alberto Lleó and Judith Balmaña, are doctors by profession — a fact that underscores the project's motivation: health, care, and the long-term wellbeing of a landscape and a community. They have entrusted the technical direction to Joan Asens and Aina Mariné, two oenologists who share the belief that wine is made in the vineyard, and the viticultural supervision to Joan Bonfill, who tends the old vines with the patience of a man who knows that 1974 plantings do not yield to hurry.

The identity is defined by the concept of revival — not invention, not innovation for its own sake, but the careful, respectful restoration of a winemaking life that was interrupted but never destroyed. The 36 years of silence between 1986 and 2022 were not an abandonment; they were a pause. The vines continued to grow. The chapel continued to host the neighbourhood's annual summer festival. The stone walls continued to breathe. And when the first modern vintage was bottled in January 2023, it was not the beginning of something new but the resumption of something ancient. The labels — clean, modern, bearing the masia's silhouette and the words Tradició Familiar — reflect this dual nature: a contemporary presentation of an ancient continuity. The wines are organic, spontaneously fermented, minimally handled, and aged in the same underground nave where Modesto Lleó's barrels once stood.

The future of Can Lleó is tied to the continued restoration of the historic winery, the organic conversion of the full 100 hectares, the maturation of the newly planted Sumoll vines, and the gradual expansion of a portfolio that now speaks to both the heritage-conscious drinker and the natural wine enthusiast. The Brisat Macabeu Vinya Meix will continue to be the flagship — a wine that proves old-vine Macabeo on limestone can achieve world-class expression when handled with patience and honesty. The Ancestral Parellada will continue to capture the joyful, celebratory side of the project. The Genuí Garnatxa will continue to prove that the Penedès can produce reds of immediate pleasure and honest fruit. And as the Sumoll comes online, the estate will add another chapter to its recovery of indigenous Catalan varieties — a living proof that the most important wine is not the one that scores highest, but the one that carries the memory of the place where it was grown, the family that grew it, and the centuries of silence and sound that echo through every bottle.

In an age of increasing industrialisation in wine — of global varieties, engineered yeasts, and corporate consolidation — Can Lleó de Vilanoveta stands as a compelling alternative, not because it rejects modernity but because it has embraced a deeper modernity: one that values a 1497 masia over a new warehouse, a 17th-century cellar over a stainless steel tank farm, organic farming over chemical dependence, indigenous varieties over international imports, bush vines over trellising, hand-harvesting over mechanisation, indigenous yeasts over inoculation, large foudres over new barrels, minimal intervention over standardised stability, the family revival over the corporate launch, and the specific voice of Sant Martí Sarroca's calcareous soils over the standardised replication of a global style. Can Lleó is not merely making wine; it is proving that a family can return to its land after 36 years, that a medieval masia can produce wine as honest as anything from the Jura or the Loire, and that the simplest philosophy — el vino se hace en la viña — is often the most profound. From the 1751 inventory to the 2023 bottling, from Jaume Lleó's 100 cargas to the 2,800 bottles of Brisat Macabeu, from the silence of 1986 to the sound of corks drawn in the 17th-century cellar: all united in one bottle, one family, one unanswerable argument for the possibility of organic, indigenous, hand-made, heritage-driven, passionately honest wine from the heart of the Alt Penedès.